Development of these batteries to be completed by mid-2021.
This is game-changing.
The race has been on for a few years. The finish line is battery cell technology that can provide a huge range, excellent durability, and capable of handling seriously rapid charging. SK Innovation has announced that they’re now extremely close to reaching these goals with new battery cells.
Batteries that will be able to deliver such performance will inevitably take electric vehicle adoption by the masses to the next level. Little was shared by SKI at the recent battery-tech trade conference sponsored by the South Korean government according to greencareports.com. The only detail given is that the cells consist of high-density nickels and technologies that can manage more than 1,000 charge/discharge cycles.
2019 Kia Niro PHEV | Photo: Kia
SKI has been working on battery technology development since 1996 and has supplied plug-hybrid vehicles with batteries for more than 10 years, such as PHEVs sold by Kia. They are also building a two-factory complex in Georgia which will supply up to 300,000 EVs for Volkswagen and Ford with fresh batteries.
SKI also happened to point out that, unlike their competitor LG Chem, no battery fire incidents have been reported with vehicles powered by their units.
SK Innovation Georgia | Photo: SK Innovation
News about battery development reminds me of computer company announcements in times past. We called it “vapor-ware”, referring to hardware or software that was announced but was not yet available. These announcements were designed to discourage companies from buying currently available products from competitors. By promising wonderful capabilities, if you would just wait for their next great thing, companies like IBM would make purchasing currently available products from their competitors seem foolish. Now we continually get announcements about battery improvements that discourage buyers from buying currently available EVs. Since many of these announcements never materialize please stop teasing buyers with these “vapor-battery” announcements.